‘Thumbing the Nose’: CNN’s Erin Burnett Reports Maduro’s No. 2 Is Defying Trump

CNN’s Erin Burnett reported Saturday that Nicolas Maduro’s right hand, Delcy Rodriguez, was “thumbing the nose” at Donald Trump following his assertion that his administration was now running Venezuela.

Trump held a press conference Saturday to announce that Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, had been apprehended and were on their way to the U.S. to face drug charges. Trump further announced that his team, including Marco Rubio and Pete Hegseth, would be running the South American country until further notice.

“The big development this moment is that the vice president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez, has just appeared on camera for the first time and said she’s in charge,” Burnett said. “Flanked by military officials and other power brokers in Venezuela, calling Maduro’s capture a kidnaping, demanding his immediate release and saying that Venezuela will not be a colony of the United States.”

Burnett called Rodriguez’s action, “a defiant move given that Trump has said his team is running the country and that she’s doing everything they want, and given the situation under which the United States took Nicolas Maduro, the thumbing of the nose pretty stunning at this moment, if that’s what it appears to be.”

Shortly after his press conference, Trump told The New York Post that U.S. troops will not be stationed in Venezuela as long as Rodriguez “does what we want.”

When asked by Post reporter Steven Nelson if “US troops [will] be on the ground helping run the country,” Trump responded, “No, if Maduro’s vice president — if the vice president does what we want, we won’t have to do that.”

Trump continued, “We’re prepared. You know, we have a second wave that’s much bigger than the first wave.”

The president said that his administration has “spoken to her [Rodriguez] numerous times, and she understands, she understands.”

Watch the clip above via CNN.

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